About this blog

I recently scanned slides from my 1987 driving trip while I was in the US from Rochester NY to Florida. Fortunately I wrote an account of the trip shortly after so I can correlate many of the photos which would otherwise be a mystery to me.

I have transferred the text more or less unchanged, redacting some errors or boring details, and retained my more simple reactions at the time.

As usual, read from the oldest entry forwards, as Blogger is designed to show the latest post first.

Return to Rochester

Tom had to work all day then drive a hundred miles or so to a hotel for a dance meet. Couldn't say I envied him. We had a late night snack and chat the night before anyway.

Tom told me about the IKEA showroom outside Philadelphia. It was a gem of a find. Simple, elegant furniture and household fittings for a low price. I see how they do it. Most of the goods are for self-assembly so they save on transportation. Also they don't hire an army of salesmen. Instead you look at their showroom, decide what you like, then pick it out from their warehouse shelves. I come away with a couple of side tables, lamp stand, clip lamps and window shades, without setting off alarm bells on my credit card account. I wish I knew about this place earlier. I think it might be worthwhile to make a special trip down if I need more furniture.

The northeast Penn Turnpike extension was crowded but not unbearably so. Mostly it was the two lane traffic that kept cars bunched together. By the time I exited at Scranton, most of the other traffic had evaporated. A half-hour later, I was in New York State.

I was supposed to meet Doug at 6 pm for dinner. He transferred from Rochester to Cornell a while back. Cornell seemed to suit him better. Ithaca is on the southern tip of Lake Cayuga, a glacial lake. As is normal with glacial lakes, the lake sides are steep. Ithaca is by the lake so all roads downtown have this steep descent. I remember sitting in a boat cruising on a glacial lake in South Island, New Zealand. The captain told us the water was about a thousand feet deep under us. The thought of that much water underneath gave me the shivers.

After dinner and pleasant banter, I drove back along the eastern shore of Lake Cayuga. Most of the time I had used the other bank. I found this side nicer because the road remained within sight of the lake bank and I could see the house lights on the other bank across the narrow lake. The smell of hay and manure reminded me I was in farm country.

I saw much scenery on the trip that pleased me, especially in the Appalachians, but nothing lifted me to ecstasy. The US had that (non-)effect on me. Much of what I saw was banal. Frieda's words came back to me often: It looks so unloved. In Europe or Asia, humans look like they belong in the landscape. Even though wild forests mostly don't exist any more in those continents, nothing is untouched by civilisation and none of the animal populations are original, humans and their surroundings have adapted to each other and made the earth feel homely. In the US, humans seem transient, just a blot on the face of the earth.

One has to travel far in the US to see a change in scenery or vegetation. And yet I did not get the sensation of having traversed large distances when I reached Florida. The urban landscape was similar. You can get the same sort of fast food in Florida as elsewhere. I can already imagine what California is like, even though I have never been there. Funny how large countries tend to uniformity while small ones tend towards diversity.

Americans are too eager to destroy historical artefacts in the name of progress. There is little sense of history in this country. What's left is mostly a collection of historical markers in the landscape that are impossible to read while driving past. No traditions, nobody stays long enough in one place to acquire traditions. Patriotism seems to be more a superficial sentiment or emotional outburst than a genuine feeling. The best the American pavilion at EPCOT could offer was a band of singers rendering This Land is Your Land in dulcet tones. Why not pictures or films of the landscape, which is truly magnificent in places, like other countries? No, Americans must have words, more words to stir people. Is it any wonder nobody really loves this land?


At midnight I was at the junction of West Henrietta and I-390. I was home.

Through North Carolina, Virginia, and Delaware to Pennsylvania

A buffet breakfast, I deserve it. Then back to the harness. I think I can make Philadelphia by night. This means no side trips. I would love to see Charleston or the Cape Hatteras National Seashore, but I suspect in this beautiful weather, they'd be crowded. That was another excuse to quit Florida before the Memorial weekend. A heat wave was predicted and I didn't feel like cooking in the heat, then fighting packed highways to get home with a sick car. At this moment, back home, I don't regret the decision to leave early.

The map shows a town called South of the Border, just south of the border between North and South Carolina in I-95. Before you get there, signs with Mexican themes keep pestering one to stop and eat or buy things. When I got there, it wasn't a real town but a collection of restaurants, shops, petrol stations, motels, etc. A made-for-commerce town.

North Carolina and Virginia flew past on I-95. Interstates are just fast roads from A to B, not much point looking for scenery. Just north of Richmond I turned east to take the bridge at Annapolis so that I could avoid Washington and Baltimore. The Annapolis crossing traverses the major arm of the Chesapeake. Ships have to go underneath the bridge to reach Baltimore.

They say Du Pont owns most of Delaware. A friend of mine vigorously denies this, but the company seemed to be everywhere. Well they might at least improve the signs on the roads. I get lost for a while on Delaware country roads, then get my bearings again. Just outside Wilmington I tried phoning Tom again. Answering machine again. Is he gone or working programmer hours? Nothing for it but to try calling at home.

Rang the doorbell. If he isn't home I will nap in the car for a couple of hours then drive back to Rochester. I don't feel like spending another night in a motel, only to face Memorial Friday holiday traffic. Tom comes to the door. He's been asleep and letting the answering machine mind the shop.

To Miami then back to South Carolina

Sultry night in the dorm. Air-conditioner was no help, being worn out and weak. To rinse the sweat off I took an early morning dip in the pool. Then I packed and checked out.

I think I can make it to South Carolina by nightfall. The weather channel had forecast a stormy day. I drove past the Miami skyline, through nondescript undeveloped country, then turned north onto the Florida Turnpike. That detour to Miami wasn't worth it. It was just a waste of a couple of hours. I thought Cape Canaveral might be worth a look but decided not to go. Reached Jacksonville by 5 pm, Georgia border by 6:30. I ended up in Waltersboro, SC by the time it is too dark and I'm too tired.

The problem with beach scenery in America is that usually the waterfront is privately owned. So you never get to see all those wonderful beaches up close unless you pay through the nose to stay in a posh hotel for hundreds of dollars a night. With mountain scenery, they can't block all it from view. The other problem is there are seldom any stopping spots near scenic views. The St. Johns crossing outside Jacksonville was pretty, but I couldn't very well stop to take a picture in rush hour traffic.

Fort Lauderdale

Today's destination is Fort Lauderdale. It isn't far to go so I don't have to hurry. The plan is to spend the night at the hostel there, then drive to Key West the next day and spend one night there.

Somewhere along the way I discovered my clutch was close to worn out. I can get it to slip if I step on the accelerator hard while the car is travelling slow. That explains what the mechanic said about the clutch being high when my brakes were being fixed. Sigh. One more worry.

Billboards are very much a feature of Florida roads. The most obnoxious ones are those that pester you every mile or so, starting 30 miles or so from the attraction. More irritating are the lovebugs, a rather unlovely insect that has a habit of getting plastered over the windscreen on impact. The AAA book advises travel in the early morning or late evening to avoid these bugs. Wish I could. By the time I reach Fort Lauderdale my bumper is smattered. My windscreen isn't because I keep wiping it with cleaning spray.

Florida is a big citrus fruit producer and uncountable roadside stands offer fruit and gifts. Since I don't fancy oranges, they weren't hard to resist.

The Sol-Y-Mar hostel entry looks promising: near the beach, swimming pool, air-conditioned rooms. There were a couple of pool loungers when I arrived. The office was closed until 5 pm. A resident assured me there was no shortage of room. So I pulled up a sun chair and lazed away the afternoon in the cool breeze. So far I had only read three chapters of The American. I polished off a couple more and started reading On The Road as well. Kerouac's story of non-stop Beats wandering the US encourages rapid reading. I thought of taking a walk to the beach to see what it is like, but I was reluctant to venture into the heat. Besides, it was crowded from what I could see, driving past.

I was beginning to get bored. I have nothing against beach cities, you understand, but a constant climate of warm, sultry weather attracts people who have no more ambition than to sun all day and drink all night. Some of the residents had already been in the hostel for 4 months. I have nothing against this kind of relaxation either, but there is little else in the way of culture in such cities. So after a while, I get bored of such places.

I'm beginning to wonder if I should bother with Key West. The main reason I wanted to go there was because it is the southeast corner of the US. I've been to the northeast corner, in Maine. But I saw visions of more beach city ennui. The Keys are just a chain of islands connected by a highway. One of the towns is named Marathon, apparently what a highway engineer muttered when told to continue the highway all the way to the end. I would also miss seeing the Everglades. Oh well, I come
from the tropics so I know that sort of stuff. Then there was Miami. To come so far and not see Miami? I didn't want to stay in Miami, it was probably just Fort Lauderdale on a bigger scale. But I did want to have a glimpse of the city. Then there was the car. Would it get me back home? I felt vulnerable to mishaps, so far from home. It was the farthest I'd been away from base.

Finally, after consulting my maps, I decided to shorten my trip. Drop Key West. Drive through Miami, then turn back north. The problem was I'd told Tom, my friend in Philadelphia, I would turn up Monday night. I knew he was going away for the weekend, so I would have to arrive there before Friday. Could I make Philadelphia by Thursday night? Two days to cross FL, GA, SC, NC, VA, and MD. It would mean long driving days. Well, might as well enjoy this place today.


This place is full of Germans. There are a few Swedes and British here too. The two Swedish boys have come from LA, driving a LTD. They wanted to sell the LTD and get money to travel. While I was there a guy hired them to paint boats for $6 an hour. So they decided to stay on another week.

EPCOT

More ersatz food for breakfast. America is full of ersatz food. I must have been the last person to find out—ingredient lists are required to be in descending order of abundance. Well, my toast spread lists: corn syrup, apples, grapes, … Ah, ubiquitous corn syrup.

Today is devoted to EPCOT. I'm long past Magic Kingdom sentimentality but I've heard raves about World Showcase and Future World. I reach WD World around noon. Just outside EPCOT, a flying stone cracks my windshield half an inch from the roof. Just my luck. If I'd been going a little faster, it might have glanced off the roof instead. No hole, but several nasty spreading cracks. I don't understand how a stone came to be flying so high in the air. I was following a truck, but with another car in between. Oh well, one of those things...

EPCOT costs $28 a day to enter. A three day ticket allows one to see Magic Kingdom as well and unlimited use of the monorail connecting the two sites but I don't want to spend that much time here. The large multifaceted globe just inside the gates is Spaceship Earth, a display hosted by AT&T. It sits in the middle of Future World, a collection of hi-tech shows.

The line there is intolerable so I saunter off to World Showcase instead. This is the back half of EPCOT, so to speak, and comprises about a dozen national pavilions arranged around a man-made lake. Only a dozen? The countries here are the ones that feel they might get more tourists by having a display at EPCOT. Each display was staffed by that country's nationals, it is authentic that way at least. Wonder if they got hardship money for having to talk to silly tourists?

A glance at the folder indicated the main feature of most pavilions are gift shops and restaurants. Tables can be reserved and many good slots are booked out early. In this warm weather, food is not foremost in my mind and I am more interested in the attractions. Mexico has a boat ride through an animated display of Mexican history.

But it was China that pleasantly surprised me. I had heard of 360 degree film shows before. This is a standing room only theatre where one is surrounded by 9 screens, giving at times full circle vision of a landscape, sometimes from a plane; and at other times used to overwhelm viewers with a barrage of images. The sights and sounds of China were stirring. Many of the scenes in the film had not been seen by foreigners before. I liked this film so much that I came back to see it a second time later.

France had a 180 degree show, which was not as spectacular but equally touching. Perhaps it's because they used the music of Debussy, Saint-Saens and Satie. Canada's 360 show was quite pretty but a little too commercial. Of course they all were but there are degrees of taste. Morocco had a continuous slide display, accompanied by soundtrack, with intriguing images.

I had lunch at the Japan pavilion from the takeout section—teriyaki beef, chicken yakitori and Kirin beer. Tasty and not as expensive as you'd think. They have a display of work by women artists. One objet d'art was a video recording of an inverted pyramid of frozen stones melting and releasing stones, one at a time, to fall through a lattice of cane rods. A strange but very pleasing and relaxing sound resulted. Quite inventive.

The other pavilions were well arranged but I had no desire to spend all day at gift shops. A phone call to the Orlando branch of the hotel chain I was bumped from in DC gathered the information that the free night was for DC only and the clerk had given me the wrong information. So much for that idea.

I did not like Future World as much. Lines were longer here because the displays were snazzy but I felt they were essentially hi-tech carnival rides. In true American commercial tradition, corporations use these displays to plug their products. For example, Kodak hosted the Imagination show, which had lots of flashing lights, colored smoke and such gimmickry but little content. Kids love this sort of thing. Captain EO was a 3-D film starring Michael Jackson where he saves the world with song and dance. I enjoyed it for what it was worth, but one first has to endure a plug for Kodak film. GE hosted the Transportation show, and AT&T the Communications show in Spaceship Earth.

By 7 pm my legs felt like jelly and I decided to break for dinner. I wanted to come back and see IllumiNations, at closing time, when all the pavilions turn into lighted wonders, and lasers and fireworks punctuate the sky. I even got a re-entry stamp. But I never used it. Oh well, I have seen enough fireworks and cities at night in my time.

Some 60 miles south of Orlando I located an inexpensive motel and rested for the night. It had been such a hot day that it took the air-conditioner half an hour to displace the warm air trapped in the room.

Atlanta

Besides Gone With The Wind, which plays all the time at one Atlanta theatre, the only other thing I know about Atlanta is Stone Mountain.This is a granite outcrop which stood out when the surrounding rocks wore down over geological time. Today it is a State Park and a major recreational resource for Atlantans. There is a giant sculpture on one face of the rock. It depicts Lee, Jackson and Jefferson Davis, on horseback. This work was discontinued twice and finally finished in the 60s. Some nights in summer laser beams play on the rock. One can ride a cable car to the top of the mountain and observe the surrounding plain. All flat. In the distance, the Atlanta skyline.

On our way to downtown Atlanta, I passed this bald headed man in a convertible, taking the full brunt of the hot sun. Mad dogs and Atlantans…

Georgia has the lowest petrol prices I have seen anywhere. The road advertisements often mention diesel, which means that many trucks go through Georgia.

I thought it was only 150 miles to the Florida border, but it was a misprint. It was more like 200. Then another 60 miles or so before it was too late to check in at any motel. I decided to spend the night at Lake City, a somewhat neglected part of Florida, now that all eyes are on Orlando, Walt Disney World and Miami. Accommodation was cheaper too.